Newton's Dark Secrets

[MythMath]

Caught this NOVA episode about
Newton the Alchemist the other night:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/newton/
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/newton/images/lega-newtonwilliambl-l.jpg
Newton by Blake


Here's an interview with the historian who has recreated
some of Newt's alchemical experiments in the lab:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/newton/alch-newman.html

[Naomi]

Haaaaaaaaaa

"A Legitimate Pursuit

NOVA: Why are people surprised when they hear that Isaac Newton—the grand patriarch of physics—was an alchemist?
NEWMAN: Well, I think it's because alchemy has been portrayed as the epitome of irrationality and a sort of avaricious folly.
NOVA: Sinister, dark-robed sorcerers trying to turn lead into gold. Is that an accurate picture of alchemists in Newton's time?
NEWMAN: It's accurate for some alchemists. But we now know that most of the great minds of the period were involved in alchemy, including Robert Boyle, John "


"omg is m1thr0s like an evil sorcerer!?!"

- LadyHydralisk

[Radiant Star]

NOVA: Why are people surprised when they hear that Isaac Newton—the grand patriarch of physics—was an alchemist?
I would think most magickians would know that Newton was an alchemist and be surprized to hear that he was one of was the greatest English mathematicians of his generation!

Good find MythMath, like the conversational tone to it too. Might need this in a few weeks for something I am going to be looking at.

Cool :cool:

[deviadah]

Well, when Newton died a lot of his works were marked NOT FIT TO BE PRINTED, over halv a million words actually, and most were of a heremtic nature. In about 1936 it resurfaced at an auction. In this sense Newton was not the first modern scientist, but more one of the last magus (of Agrippa status).

We can't be sure that Newton would have liked that the world sees him as a scientist rather than a Alchemist.

[Apopheros]

I wonder how much his personal notes could sell at an auction...

[astrea]

Newton , like many of the scientists, and Alchemists of his time(our time depending on ones own concept of time) was a freemason, and to him i am sure because of the nature of freemasonry at the time would loved to be known for his alchemy as well as for his mathematics , who knows , maybe more so1

[m1thr0s]

We can't be sure that Newton would have liked that the world sees him as a scientist rather than a Alchemist. I suspect that this is probably the case. Science has claimed him because they would like us all to believe he was somehow a product of Science itself. But this is a lie. It is quite remarkable really, the number of lies that have come to be called Modern Science...

no worries...the truth will out in the end...

m1thr0s

[Logos]

The Janus Faces of Genius by Betty Jo Dobbs is a fantastic book all about Newton's alchemical and theological writings. Apparently, 70% or so of everything Newton wrote was alchemical or theological. Even his famous Opticks experiments were conducted under the pretense that they would reveal the alchemical properties of light.

Edit: you may already know, but back when I was working on my thesis, I consulted Newman a few times and in one of our exchanges he leaked (and this was about two years ago, so it's probably not much of a secret anymore) that he and a colleague of his are working on an online database of all of Newton's alchemical writings, so you can log in and read every manuscript Newton ever wrote concerning alchemy.

In related news, University of Virginia's William Blake Archive (http://www.blakearchive.org/blake/) is also a great little online resource.

-Logos

[Radiant Star]

I got The Last Sorcerer (http://www.amazon.com/Isaac-Newton-Sorcerer-Helix-Books/dp/073820143X) by Michael White a few months back and it looks to have good reviews. Has anyone else read it?

He is one of the key mathematicians we will be looking at in class and obviously Principia is something we will be spending some time on. Doubt I will fully understand the maths, but the history side of things should be very interesting.